There are a lot of things I like to do, but exercise is not one of them. I only exercise because I know it is good for me and because my dad had a heart attack. To be honest, if I didn’t have to exercise, I just wouldn’t do it.

However, reality is that exercise is important and so in my goals to improve my health and lifestyle, I bought a pedometer.

I have thought about getting a pedeometer for a couple years, but being a major procrastinator when it comes to shopping, it wasn’t until last week that I finally decided to get one. I heard that 10,000 steps is a good daily goal but had no idea how much I actually walk.

Unfortunately, my pedometer came on Friday, in the midst of a week of battling a cold. This cold has wiped me out. I missed a day of work this week and have been sleeping 10-12 hours a day.

So my first two days of measuring steps have been pretty dismal as most of the time I have been lying in bed or on the sofa.

However, not to be deterred, I am very excited to embark on my new goal of walking across the United States using my pedometer. I discovered there is a map that goes across the United States, called the American Discovery Trail.

Apparently some people are trying to walk this for real and made a very handy dandy Google Map.

So I did a screen capture starting from the East Coast and am tracking my daily progress coloring in the path on Photoshop, with number of steps and mileage.

Sadly, I walked a pathetic 1.08 miles in the first 2 days (since i was sick). I barely made it a mile from the ocean! Ohhh boy, this is going to be a looooooong trip. At this rate I will walk til I am 100 years old.

What is also very cool is Google Maps has a street view so I can even see where I am going! Unfortunately there is no view of the ocean. The furthest it starts is where I started today, about 1 mile where Cape Henlopen Dr starts (at the intersection of Engineer Road). So here is where I started my journey today!

I think this will be a fun journey because:

1. It helps me exercise.

2. I hate failing and now I have published this post for the world to see which means I need to walk as much as I can because I like to finish projects I start.

3. I get to “see” America.

4. I don’t even have to walk outdoors, which is at times nice but often uncomfortable due to my allergies.

5. And it doesn’t even cost anything!

Well the good news is that just from walking around at church today I already logged over 3000 steps which is more than what I did so far combined since getting the pedometer! Maybe I’ll even make it out of the park by the end of the day!